Thomas Spencer

Thomas Spencer

Born Arklow Ireland? 1816

Died Muswellbrook 1888

Thomas and his new wife Mary arrived in Sydney on 7th of September 1841 in the ship China. They were bounty immigrants from Wicklow Ireland and within two months Thomas was working as a shepherd on Binjeberry Estate. They were allocated a slab hut on Rouchel Brook and provided with an allowance of 10 pounds of meat, 10 pounds of flour, 2 pounds of sugar and a quarter of a pound of tea per week and an annual salary of £10. In 1841 this was a very remote location as there were only about 1500 people in the entire Hunter Valley.

By 1855 Thomas had saved enough to buy 99 acres of land on Rouchel Brook which he called Rouchel Vale. Thomas and his sons gradually increased their total land holding at Rouchel to around 2500 acres.

Thomas became the first postmaster at Rouchel with the post office operating from Rouchel Vale for several years in the 1870’s. The family were pioneers in the growing of Lucerne as a commercial silage crop in the Rouchel valley. The family also provided the land for the construction of St Johns Anglican church at Rouchel which was also used as a public school from 1881 to about 1896.

Thomas and Mary retired to a house in Muswellbrook in the mid 1880s. Thomas died in 1888 and Mary died in 1901. The family sold Rouchel Vale in 1888